I had an extremely inspiring and unforgettable encounter with WLS twelve years ago. He is the real thing. I'll get back to you on this in a couple of days when I'm back at home.

Musically, Smith had already been progressing along similar lines, his ears having been opened by Ornette Coleman's early albums. But he cites Miles Davis' Kind of Blue as the precursor to the AACM's experiments. Miles, according to Smith, "reduced all of the crap that bebop had put into the music, and made it so that you could actually articulate ideas as opposed to technique. Listen to any bebop player, Charlie Parker straight on across, you'll find that they have more of an exhibitionist approach to ideas."

go leo go

Yep I’m checking out divine love right now
I’m ashamed to say I don’t own a lot of wadadda product

I have this divine love album on a cassette
It’s lovely and spacey not a goddam drum in sight
I’m pleased to say

I was quite disturbed to see wadadda has a combo
Featuring jack de johnette
What the hell must that be like
I mean he’s a bit heavy that de johnettte innit
Heavy rhythm mother innit>>

What I like about leo smith is the space
I have a double album of smith with jarman and roscoe Mitchell
Illegally burned non-product you understand.

I haven’t followed smith’s progress closely over the years
Didn’t he go funky at some point>?
Or  did I dream that

He sounds like one fully switched on heavy dude
I like it when they can discuss the music
Sound wise politically wise and philosophically wise

Which was something I liked about the sync or swarm book
Reading stuff by evan parker where he can actual describe/defend
Analyse what he’s done is doing.

The unexamined life is the life not worth living etc

He’s a bit patriarchal in his language though young leo

Ah well

yes, evan parker (and others) earlier on made a big point about 'improvisation is better than composition'  but he has turned against this, even writing a piece (boustrophedon, out on ECM, rather disappointing I have to say). and of course composition/compositional techniques have always been there with certain composers. in point of fact, there's a recording by derek bailey called 'pieces for guitar', out on tzadik, which is early tapes he made for study purposes when develping his style - they're the earliest available solo guitarecordings available from him, and include a couple of composed pieces. I was listening to Webern today; clearly a big influence of bailey.

And of course combinatorial serialism.

Re: Bailey. I could post a link from where you could download it, but that probably wouldn't be very 'ethical'! The first track, 'G.E.B' (dedicated to Bailey's father) is not particularly Webern-like, in point of fact - more like Don Van Vliet's composed guitar pieces, 'Peon' or 'One Red Rose That I Mean'. 'Practising: Wow and Stereo' is probably the most like the improvised work of DB's that people are more familair with. I think you can download the whole thing from emusic.

It's also worth checking out DB's playing with Tony Oxley on some early recordings, including 'The Baptisted Traveller', where he makes 'Stone Garden', written by saxophonist Charlie Mariano (he of Black Saint/Sinner Lady fame) sound very strange indeed, though the rest of the band seem to be playing in a less 'out' manner (more 'progressive jazz' than 'avant-garde') - he leaves disturbing masses of sound hanging in the air in a very unjazzy way.